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Aelian Crusade
The Aelian Crusade is a campaign going from Y820M41 to Y03M42. It was initiated by an alliance of the Rustbitten Templars Sapce Marines, the Aelian Hellwalkers Imperial Guard, the Adeptus Mechanicus and the Forge Wardens Space Marines. It's goal was to retake Forgeworld Aelia and the subsector surrounding it from the Orks. Carrying this operation out met with difficulties however, when the Dark Ravagers and Sons of Tzeench Chaos warbands appeared on Aelia, looking for a powerful relic, that they could use to fuel the ascension of their leader to daemon form. Preparation The Rustbitten Templars have never been as strong as they were in the 807th year of the 41st millenium. With around 530 fully developed Space Marines, they felt ready for a battle. For a campaign, that will carve their names next to those doing the greatest for mankind. They wanted to initiate a crusade. The general of the Aelian Hellwalkers made a visit to the newly-built Battlebarge of the Chapter. He has told Flavius Varro, the chapter master of the Rustbitten Templars, that his reiment would need a homeworld, was it to endure. Varro, who appreciated old alliances promised him that he would take back Subsector Aelia for the regiment and the chapter - or die trying. Thirteen years later, the chapter was ready. The orders to warp have almost been given, when a huge Adeptus Mechanicus fleet arrived, led by a Magos called Juvenius. This Magos has told Varro that the Mechanicus was interested in his operations, and seeing his lack of troop versatility and armored vechiles, they had decided to give him an entire Skitarii legion for support, along with an armored company of the Mechanicus' old time allies, the Forge Wardens space marine chapter, led by Captain Kar Sorran. With that, the Aelian Crusade has begun. The Aelian Subsector contained six planets: the forgeworld Aelia, three agri-worlds and two hiveworlds. The crusading forces have taken all of the agri-worlds before they headed for Aelia. At that point, it seemed like that they have overestimated the resistance they would meet. Only at the forgeworld did they realize, that the Orks did not draw their forces from the less important worlds without a reason... The War of Aelia When the Crusader fleet arrived at Aelia, they arrived between a small Ork fleet and a Chaos fleet equal to theirs in size. Since they were in the line of fire, the Imperial ships immediately engaged the Chaos fleet trying to get out of the range of the Orks. Meanwhile, the Skitarii, the Forge Vardens and three Rustbitten Templar companies were deployed on the surface as vanguard under the command of First Company Captain Tiberius Valer. In those three companies was the chapter's honor guard, led by Chapter Champion Valrak Baneaxe. These forces managed to clear a wide landing zone and get intel on their heretical foes. It quickly became apparent that their enemies were traitor Astartes from a warband called the Dark Ravagers. According to records, these marines were dedicated to Chaos Undivided, and always showed up assisting other heretical forces. The warband was estimated to contain about seven hundred marines, with at least three hundred dedicated to a single Chaos God, with the rest serving the ruinous powers as one. The Dark Ravagers were supported by about two million traitor guardsmen, and daemons of all kinds, from chaos spawn to horrors. About half of these forces came barring down on the landing loyalists. The captain of the Forge Wardens, Kar Sorran and Valrak Baneaxe, despite never having fought together, commanded their forces in perfect harmony. While the Forge Wardens let volley after volley into the traitors from their masterr crafted weapons and vechiles, while the Rustbitten Templars honor guard and assault marines prioritized the opposing havocs while quickly bailing out from time to time to fight off Khornate forces getting too close to their fire support. In the meantime, the 150 scouts of the Rustbitten Templars began infiltrating the lines of the traitor guard dug in around the landing zone. Brother Tram of the Forge Wardens later highlighted in his report that the trench he and his squad were supressing became empty in a matter of minutes, with the only signs of fighting being the occasional screams and muzzle flashes, but even those showing up few and far between. As soon as the scouts and the skitarii occupied the trenches, the chaos marines bailed out, while a few fliers came in to gave them supressing fire for cover. When the landing zone was cleared, the Templars and the Skitarii deployed in almost full strength, only leaving about ten percent of their forces in orbit for backup. The Aelian Hellwalkers also made planetfall to hold the line while the elite forces pushed for the main manufactorum, where the signs of a heretical ritual started emerging. Leading this offfensive was by First Company Captain Tiberius Valer, who has proven his tactical excellence when designing the tactics that kept the chapter alive, advanced the front by three thousand miles in but a year. It was then